The 1994 ceasefire brought a tenuous end to the Karabakh War. Negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan have been ongoing for the past twenty years under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chaired by the United States, France and Russia.

BY MARIA TITIZIAN In the absence of faith and hope and belief living can often be dwindled away, becoming mundane, a chore, destroying the core of what we were meant to do or be to others as human beings. These past few weeks we have been in a deep winter freeze in Yerevan. Temperatures have…

When my Marashtsi grandmother moved to Canada, I was 12 years old. I had only seen pictures of her. She was the typical Armenian grandmother of her generation, the survivor generation…plump, dressed in dark clothes, long, willowy white hair tied in a bun, round face, full lips and tired eyes. When she finally landed in Toronto, I thought my life would be complete. I had felt the absence of grandparents in my life and I was ready to embrace her wholly.

A friend who recently returned from abroad conveyed that many Armenians in the Diaspora are frustrated and fed-up with the shenanigans of our government. They are tired of hearing about corruption, monopolies, poor governance, rigged elections and an overall lack of vision and policy.

Being sentimental is a way of life for me. I wish I was less temperamental and could place a significant amount of distance between my mental health and my actual life, but I realize this is never going to happen. While it means I wear my heart on my sleeve, I have finally made my peace with this personal characteristic because it also allows me to be open to the splendor of life.